Running with the Shadows of the Night
by Wolf Maid
Summary: Ian/Alan. Set during JP1. Implied Ellie/other. Ian and Alan bond after they distract the T-Rex from the kids and then get chased and lost. Cue Adventure.
1. Part I

AN: This is my Alan/Ian fic. I stopped working on it for a long whiles, but I'm back on board (finally).

Ian/Alan. Set during JP1. Implied Ellie/other. Ian and Alan bond after they distract the T-Rex from the kids and then get chased and lost. Cue Adventure.

And yes, I'm playing with timing a bit. Rather than have them sit uselessly all night, Arnold and Hammond go ahead and reboot the computers around dawn. And I'm experimenting with this style. It's pretty fun to write.

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* * *

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_We're running with the shadows of the night_

_So baby take my hand, you'll be all right_

_Surrender all your dreams to me tonight_

_They'll come true in the end_

_./.  
_

…Running with the Shadows of the Night…

./.

So Ian's a little jumpy. Given the fact that they're only on their feet thanks to rainwater, the rest of Ian's whiskey, adrenaline, and oh yeah, the sheer terror of being eaten alive by dinosaurs, Alan can't really blame him. They've been on the run for half the night, which could no doubt sound daring and grand until one added up the minutes and realized that half the night literally translated to six hours.

Six hours since the jeeps had shut down. Six hours since they'd spotted the T-Rex. Six hours since it had gone for the lawyer and the kids and Ian had tried to distract it by shouting and Alan had—literally—saved him from the jaws of death with a well-placed shove…

….which carried them right over the edge.

They'd gotten tangled up in the vines on the way down (thank God) and then the Rex had followed them back into the enclosure (less good) and Ian—who's never liked heights—looked down and realized the vines in which they were trapped were suspending them a good 20-30 feet off the ground.

Which, Ian realized, watching Alan struggle to extract himself, would mean that getting free would mean getting broken bones (at the very least) and oh yeah, they were surrounded by _dinosaurs_ so maybe they should think things through a little before they plummeted to their no-doubt inevitable demise?

Ian, still tangled in the vines, managed a foothold in one that seemed (relatively) stable and used to it to hurl himself bodily at Alan, who squawked (loudly) as they both dropped a couple of feet before the vines readjusted to hold their combined weight.

The T-Rex, attracted by the movement and noise, was suddenly within Ian's peripheral, and Alan, who appeared to be choosing this particularly terrible moment to string together in an irritated rant the most words Ian had yet to hear him say, hadn't appeared to notice. And if Ian hadn't been completely trapped in vines, dangling above the ground and about to be snapped up as an oversized pet treat and hadn't been unable (for the one unfortunate time in his life) to get a word in edgewise…

Well, he might have made a different decision.

As it was, he'd leaned closer to a surprised Alan and planted his lips firmly on the other man's, expecting at any moment a headbutt and not at all the soft, _(responsive?)_ mouth that changed his thoughts from _'Shut up, _shut up_ crazy dino man!' _to the soft, pleasant hum of contentment that was interrupted by the wicked voice in his mind that whispered _'Next _Mrs._ Malcolm? Or maybe—_'

And then the _entire_ mood was ruined by the earth-trembling sound of footsteps coming closer. Their lips were no longer locked but the sound of their shaky breaths were deafening in each other's ears and they stayed there, frozen, long after the T-Rex's footsteps had faded into the distance. Slowly Alan met Ian's eyes, and despite their wide, terrified state they reminded him that he was still lying on top of the man.

"Sorry," he mumbled, attempting (in his own noble way) to maneuver himself (gracefully) off of Alan. He fell about a foot before Alan had (somehow) rolled over and grabbed his arms. The movement jerked the vines again and they continued down about two more feet before the vines caught, both still dangling in mid-air.

Alan glanced up at the tree above them and then back down at Ian with an ironic smile. "No need to be sorry," he said, continuing their conversation as if there had been no interruption. "You seem to have saved me from becoming dinner."

"For now," Ian murmured.

And that seemed to be that. It had taken them a good hour to get untangled without falling (there'd been a couple close calls and catches) and work their way back to the ground.

The far-too close roar of the T-Rex had sent them scrambling and (no surprise) right over the edge of a relatively steep incline and down into the (shocking!) river at the bottom. Ian had a hard time containing his joy.

Fairly (read hopelessly) lost, complete darkness surrounding them, and now soaking wet, Ian would've traded his last three wives (okay, so not that great a sacrifice, but still) for the ability to find some place to huddle (read cuddle) and get some sleep.

Unfortunately, while the T-Rex was almost certainly not stalking them it stayed just close enough to give the impression of following, and roared just enough to seem like it was hunting them, and kept getting close enough to make Ian, at least, certain that it had affixed one of them with a tracking device. Alan just dismissed the idea with a blank (though highly effective) stare.

So here they are. Still running for their lives, fighting fear and leg cramps and their natural instinct to pretend they aren't lost _(men)_.

"It has to sleep sometime, right?" Ian asks, peering over his shoulder for what he's affectionately nicknamed the 'Giant Jaws of Doom.' (Ian's a little more tired than he'd like to let on).

Alan appears to be ignoring him (per usual) and is instead staring up at a large tree. "Does this look familiar to you?" he asks. Ian looks up and waits for his tired eyes to focus.

"Not especially," he sighs. "But then, we're kinda in a forest, so…"

"I think we're close to where we fell!" Alan says, shooting him a positively delightful grin. Ian follows half-heartedly.

Twenty minutes later they're looking up at a tangled knot of vines.

"Huh," Ian says, considering how close they came to _never getting down_. What a lame way to die… '_Drs. Malcolm and Grant were found trapped in vines. They appeared to have died of dehydration…'_

"We should definitely get eaten if it comes down to it. Dehydration is _so_ last year," Ian comments thoughtfully. Alan slowly turns to stare at him, eyebrow inching up. And then he freezes.

"Ian…" he starts, but Ian's face is edging toward fury rather than fear.

"That's it, I'm done, this thing has chased us all night—"

"Ian, shut _up!_" Alan hisses, vainly trying to grab hold of one of Ian's wildly gesticulating arms.

"No, it needs to know that this is completely—" he continues, and then Alan has barreled into his body and is pinning him in place against a nearby tree. "…unacceptable…" he murmurs softly.

Alan, if he'd been thinking clearly rather than considering evil dinosaurs and wondering how the two of them keep ending up with their bodies pressed together, might have been able to come up with a more effective plan for silencing and distracting Ian. Instead, his hand (completely of its own volition) is suddenly tugging Ian's head down and Ian—for once appearing to be speechless—doesn't appear to be protesting.

Alan hasn't kissed someone up against a tree since high school. Ian hasn't _been_ kissed up against a tree since junior high.

Which is maybe why they don't immediately notice the herbivore (with apparent brain damage) that wanders behind them. They vaguely hear a roar, and when they pull (reluctantly) apart they spot the T-Rex carrying away her breakfast.

"Huh," Alan says, voice thoughtful. Ian just stares at him. "Sorry," Alan adds, stepping back a little and waving a hand to encompass the entire situation.

"Not at all," Ian replies, lips twitching up. "No one wants to be dino breakfast, and I was kind of…"

"Not thinking straight?" Alan supplies, lifting an eyebrow.

"Yeah, that or…insane," Ian smirks. Alan glances back over to the cement wall they'd fallen off of earlier.

"So," he says, scratching his cheek in a contemplative manner.

"Oh, I am _not_ risking death-by-dehydration by climbing back up those vines," Ian snaps.

Twenty minutes later, Ian is attempting to get untangled from the vine that seems to be lusting after his right ankle.

"Alan," he says at last, "There—ah—there appears to be some sort of—"

"Hold still," Alan growls, dropping down until he's next to Ian's would-be flailing foot. Frowning in concentration he begins separating and sliding the vines off.

"So how are you enjoying your holiday?" Ian asks snarkily. Alan glances up at him with a little grin.

"I've had worse," he replies at last, now, having freed Ian, sliding back up.

"Worse than this," Ian deadpans, disbelief obvious.

"Well, the company's not bad," Alan grins, and then starts back up. Ian is just glad that his hands are still tangled so that he doesn't accidentally let go and plummet back to the earth. Slowly he starts up again.

Twenty minutes later they crest the top. One jeep—theirs, Ian realizes—appears to have been stepped on, but the other is still stopped where it had been. The nearby outhouse has been crushed, however, and there's blood and…

"The kids!" Ian and Alan half-shout at the same time, dashing over to the one remaining jeep.

The door is empty, the jeep is empty, and they look at each other, silent (terrified).

"Hammond would've got them," Alan says. Ian nods determinedly.

"Right."

"Ellie wouldn't have stood for them out here all night."

"Right," Ian repeats. They stand there, silent, looking at each other.

"I really hate this place," Alan says quietly, and Ian grabs his hand and squeezes it tight for a moment, and then drops it, looking startled. Alan looks at him, perplexed.

They both look at the car in front of them. Ian clears his throat.

"We should get back to the complex?" he offers. Alan nods.

"After you?"

Ian smirks. "Maybe you should lead."

./.

…_tbc…_

_./.  
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AN: This is the first part, I'll put the next part up tomorrow.


	2. Part II

AN: Sorry I didn't update this immediately as I said I would, I've been having a few health problems that I'm trying to take care of, so all my updating is taking a bit of a break for the moment. Sorry!

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…Part II…

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"_I really hate this place," Alan says quietly, and Ian grabs his hand and squeezes it tight for a moment, and then drops it, looking startled. Alan looks at him, perplexed._

_They both look at the car in front of them. Ian clears his throat._

"_We should get back to the complex?" he offers. Alan nods._

"_After you?"_

_Ian smirks. "Maybe you should lead."_

They stumble forward.

The world is a bit blurry, one of those fantastic side-effects of lack of sleep, but Alan grabs Ian's arm when he trips, and then forgets to remove it.

The first touch of light is inching along the sky when they finally come into sight of civilization (or what passes for it here).

At least the rain has lessened (a bit).

Their legs are rather liberally coated in mud, thanks to the frequent slipping and falling, and they haven't eaten anything in hours upon hours, and Ian Malcolm is Not Happy.

Except he slips for the umpteenth time, swearing soundly, but when a tired Alan reaches down a hand and offers up a smile despite the circumstances, Ian smiles back at him and let's himself be helped up.

And maybe his mood isn't quite as bad as he'd originally thought.

When they enter the building and come across the banquet of food, they're hard-pressed to not _descend_ upon it like the biblical plague of locusts.

Alan rather thinks he ought to find the others, however, and despite his generous offer Ian's not about to allow him out of his sight.

Quite a few wrong turns later, Muldoon is standing in front of them, gun raised, finger on the trigger, and they both simultaneously yell and drop to the ground.

"_Christ!"_ Muldoon swears, lowering the ground. "You tramp around like a pack of bloody_ elephants_, what were you expecting, you idiots?"

Alan full on glares at him from where he's sprawled on the floor. "Put the gun down, Muldoon," he says, his words precise and not half biting. Muldoon shrugs, and leans it back against his shoulder casually.

"We were wondering where you'd got to," he says, as Alan gets to his feet and then half-hauls Ian up as well.

"The kids?" Ian asks, and Muldoon nods.

"They're fine. Gennaro wasn't so lucky."

"Then maybe you can take us somewhere safer?" Alan asks, irritated, and Ian nudges him with a smirk. Alan rolls his eyes but settles, and Muldoon watches, intrigued.

"This way," he offers, and then shrugs and leads them off.

Several more twisting hallways, and he politely pretends not to hear the whispered conversation taking place behind them.

"You could be nicer," Ian half-snarks. Alan rolls his eyes.

"I was being nice."

"He did find us."

"We got this far, I think we could've made it the extra twenty yards."

Muldoon knocks on the door before opening it, so the people inside aren't out-right terrified. They are, however, a bit shocked when Ian and Alan enter.

"Alan!" Ellie yells, standing up, but before she can get close Lex and Timmy have full-out flung themselves at Alan and Ian, and, unprepared, the four of them fall to the ground in a tangle of limbs.

"You okay? You okay?" Ian asks, wrapping his arms around Tim as Lex buries her face in Alan's chest and bursts into tears.

"It followed you back into the cage b-but then it came back—" Timmy starts, wide-eyes locked on Ian's.

"And h-he left us! H-he saw the dinosaur coming and he ran and hid—" Lex continues, voice getting higher and higher.

"And it stomped around and then we could hear you two yelling and it followed you back in—"

"We thought you were dead!"

"Dead? Us?" Ian laughs, ruffling Tim's hair. "Nah—it took one look at Alan's ugly mug and it ran away screaming for its mother!"

Alan, who is trying to figure out what to do with an armful of sobbing preteen girl, shoots him a dirty look that Ian just ignores. Luckily for him, the death grip Lex has on Alan's shirt (and underneath, skin) prevents him from doing anything more threatening than narrowing his eyes. Ian winks jauntily in reply.

"Th-thank you," Lex sniffles into his shirt. Ellie is attempting to hide her smile behind her hands. Ian isn't even bothering to do that.

"We were worried about you," Hammond cuts in. "I'm glad you made it…although, I guess what better person to get you both back safely than a dinosaur expert?"

"Funny," Alan says, not looking at all amused. "Considering that we've spent the night hiding from creatures that went extinct 65 million years ago—"

"—_and_ climbing _vines_!" Ian cuts in, sounding outraged. Alan's face softens a bit as he looks at Ian and then finishes.

"—I think perhaps we should be considering how to get _out_ of this mess."

"We haven't exactly been sitting around," Muldoon says, frowning.

"We rebooted the system and Mr. Arnold went to reset the breakers a bit ago, but he hasn't returned," Ellie says.

"I was taking a little look around for him when I ran in to you, actually," Muldoon says.

"We just need to give him a little more time," Hammond says.

Ian and Alan exchange looks.

"You do realize there are…uh…dinosaurs out there, yes?" Ian asks, frowning at Hammond.

"Dr. Malcolm," Hammond says, more than an edge to his voice, but Ellie interrupts.

"We could go look for him? It wouldn't exactly do any harm."

Ian and Alan look at each other, and despite the fact that they haven't slept (or eaten) they realize with a sigh that they're both willing to go back out there.

"Where are the breakers located?" Alan says, a bit of a grumble in his voice, which makes Ian smirk a little. Muldoon frowns.

"I'll go," he says, and when Ian opens his mouth to volunteer (and he did not see that coming, clearly Alan's a bad influence) Muldoon unlocks a cabinet. And there, there are guns. Ian's eyebrow lifts up, clearly intrigued, and Alan tries not to groan at the terrifying image of Ian wielding a gun.

"You can't go on your own," Ellie says, arms crossed firmly in front of her. "I'll go with you."

"Ellie," Alan says, obviously irritated, and she shakes her head.

"You look like crap, Alan. You're clearly in no shape to be wandering around avoiding dinosaurs, so I think I've got this one."

"But—" Alan starts, and she stares at him.

"Sit down before you fall down."

Ian isn't quite able to hide his grin, and Alan transfers his scowl to him. Ellie's lips twitch a little as she watches them, but she doesn't say anything.

"You better get back safe and sound, then," Alan says. "I'm not explaining this to your boyfriend, he's scary."

"Didn't you spend the entire night hiding from dinosaurs…?" she asks. Alan shrugs with a grin, and she smacks him lightly upside the head.

Muldoon and Ellie leave, and Hammond's talking to the kids in the corner, so Alan allows himself to slump down on the floor against the wall. Ian's busy rummaging through things, and Alan watches him lazily through half-shut eyes, almost dozing until Ian plops down next to him and nudges him, silently offering him some sort of packaged protein bar which Alan gratefully accepts.

Ian's long legs stretch out next to Alan's, and they eat in companionable silence, although Ian keeps glancing at Alan as if there's something he wants to say. Before he quite gets the chance, Tim and Lex, who have evidently escaped from their grandfather while he tries to direct Ellie and Muldoon, climb quite literally into their laps.

Alan blinks when Tim shoves between them, and then he suddenly bolts up.

"The raptors," he says, eyes wide, looking at Hammond. "You rebooted the computer—_are the raptors out?_"

Hammond stutters to a stop, and then, hesitantly, repeats the question to Muldoon. There's a decent-sized silence, and then Muldoon quietly gives the affirmative.

"_Shit,_" Alan says, and by now Ian's gently slid Lex off of him and stood up as well.

"We going after them?" Ian asks, and Alan remotely thinks he's never been quite so grateful for a companion in his life.

"I know how the raptors hunt," he says. "Ellie isn't safe out there."

Hammond's looking between the two of them, fairly distressed, but both men have rather forgotten his presence as they look at each other.

Ian starts to speak, but Alan cuts him off.

"You aren't getting a gun."

"There are man-eating _dinosaurs_ out there!"

"Yes, and they are more than enough for me to deal with without you shooting me in the back!" Alan snaps. Ian crosses his arms and stares at him. Alan adjusts his hat and stares right back. Lex and Timmy watch on, completely intrigued.

Ian smirks a little, though, and it's just enough, because Alan throws up his hands, and Ian full-out grins in victory as Alan grumbles about weapons and Ian's remarkable ability to get in trouble and how this is _so not a good idea_. Ian pretty much ignores him as he grabs two guns, tosses one to Alan, and then starts grabbing lots and lots of bullets.

Hammond is protesting that this isn't a very good idea, but Ian just gives him a gun, too.

"Can I have a gun?" Timmy asks.

Alan and Ian freeze, horrified, and as one they half-shout "NO!" Lex grins in pre-teen triumph.

"We'll be back before you even notice we're gone," Ian assures, and Alan rolls his eyes but deigns to comment.

Timmy and Lex, fairly unnerved about being relegated to their grandfather's protection (and stories) give them a hug, promise to be good, and (most important) promise to help their grandfather give directions, as they've already all had ample time to see that he's not so good at that.

"So we're really doing this, Dr. Grant?" Ian asks as he grabs a walkie and flips it on.

"I do believe we are. Would you care to lead, Dr. Malcolm?" Alan smirks. Ian rolls his eyes.

"Oh you know me and the pleasure of getting eaten alive, no one's getting in my way for that," he says.

Alan smirks and opens the door. "Lock it behind us," he orders Lex, and then they're once more off.

./.

_...tbc..._

* * *

AN: haha poor Hammond...but really, Ian and Alan kinda deserve to be a l'il pissed....


End file.
